


butter and bread

by brandywine421



Category: Daredevil (TV), Deadpool (Movieverse), Jessica Jones (TV), The Punisher (TV 2017), Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Foster Family, F/M, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-19
Updated: 2019-04-20
Packaged: 2019-10-31 08:49:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17846240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brandywine421/pseuds/brandywine421
Summary: "Can it, Casper," Jessica muttered, rolling over when she heard the hushed noises through the closed door. Matt mumbled into the pillow, a questioning sound, but wasn't awake enough to form words.She claimed one of his shirts off the floor and slipped out of the room to find out why his roommate was rummaging around this late.The trio of dobermans caught her attention first, lined up in a neat row by the door.Huh.That's new. "When did that happen?"The whiteboard on the fridge squeaked and she scanned the words in familiar cursive.*He gave them to me for my birthday.*Jess didn't know dead people celebrated birthdays. "Did you need something or are you just playing poltergeist?"(A foster sibling free-for-all inspired by the Umbrella Academy.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, my muses have been a little down lately and I've been having a lot of feels in relation to getting older and Netflix MCU (RIP) and Steve Rogers (RIP my forever bae) and general 'meh'ness about life.
> 
> But I binged The Umbrella Academy on Netflix this weekend and it made me happy in a way TV hasn't in a while.
> 
> So this is a fic with all my fave characters across multiple 'verses dropped into an Umbrella Academy type of 'verse. 7 kids adopted over a series of years by a creepy old guy that wants to train them as soldiers/assassins/spies/villains/whatev that drift apart but come back together as adults. There will be some flashbacks and some *gasp* secrets and a lot of crack - but no time travel or heavy topics - just a found family free-for-all. We're all just trying to have a good time here.

_I hope we stay_  
_Thick as thieves, butter and bread_

 

 

"Can it, Casper," Jessica muttered, rolling over when she heard the hushed noises through the closed door. Matt mumbled into the pillow, a questioning sound, but wasn't awake enough to form words.

Yeah, they'd had a good night. Took three beers to confirm they were both single and their old rules were still in place after five years of radio silence.

She claimed one of his shirts off the floor and slipped out of the room to find out why his roommate was rummaging around this late.

The trio of dobermans caught her attention first, lined up in a neat row by the door. _Huh_. That's new. "When did that happen?"

The whiteboard on the fridge squeaked and she scanned the words in familiar cursive. * ** _He gave them to me for my birthday._** *

Jess didn't know dead people celebrated birthdays. "Did you need something or are you just playing poltergeist?"

* ** _Out of treats upstairs. Cabinet please?_** *

She sighed and opened several cabinets until a bag of dog treats fell onto the counter. "I didn't think anyone went upstairs."

* ** _Old man not dead yet. Matt has groceries delivered_**.*

"Of course he does," Jessica muttered. "Need anything else?"

* _ **Make sure he pays the cable bill. I get bored when Matty dates**_.*

"Will do," Jessica nodded and watched the door open and the dogs file out into the courtyard before the lock slid back into place.

They're all haunted by their childhoods in this fucking place but only Matt suffered it by choice these days. Elektra's ashes had been scattered to the winds almost a decade ago, but their foster sister was too stubborn to choose anything but eternity with Matt at her side.

She slipped back into the bedroom and found Matt sitting up. "Who were you talking to?"

"Does Ellie really need three dogs?" she replied.

He relaxed. "Oh. Was she nice?"

"Yeah. You're right, that was weird - she hates me," Jessica realized.

Matt hummed. "That's why she has three dogs."

 

* * *

 

"You keep in touch with anyone else?" she asked, openly admiring the way he filled out those frayed sweatpants as he prepped breakfast.

"I'm the family lawyer, I get all the hospital and bail calls," he replied without turning around.

She swirled the coffee in her polar bear mug. "You're not just the family lawyer, Asshole, you're one of us."

That caught his attention and he tilted his head toward her. He hadn't put on his red shades yet and couldn't hide his concern on the single cup of coffee. "You looking to have a reunion, Jess?"

"God, no. Just curious to know who I'm likely to run into first," she admitted. "Other than Ellie."

"Are you staying in town?"

She took a deep breath. "Yeah. I was in therapy for a while, had some shit go down. I can't handle Trish right now and you're - closer to home than anywhere else I could think of."

He brought over a plate of misshapen pancakes and placed it in front of her, catching her hand. "I'm glad you're back and you can stay as long as you need, but you can't be a mooch."

"I'm insulted right now," she scoffed.

He chuckled and returned to the stove. "Seriously, Wade turns up after every 5150 and eats all my food and Frank has this idea that he can put my address down for his PO so he doesn't upset the wife."

"Frank has a wife?"

"I think she's an ex-wife now, his brats always harass me at church," he muttered absently. "Point is - you and Eddie are the only two siblings that don't turn up unannounced to eat all my food on a regular basis."

"Even Trish?" she wondered if he could hear her heart skip when she said her name.

"Ellie doesn't like her coming around but yeah, every couple of weeks she'll come by and pretend like she's not tweaking."

The door opened and the trio of dogs arrived with the rush of cool air that was Elektra. At least she closed the door behind her. The dogs greeted Matt one at a time before bounding into another room.

"Morning. Thanks for being nice," Matt said, tilting his head for what she assumed was a ghost cheek kiss. The chair slid out and family breakfast began.

"So how do I not get marked up as a mooch?" she asked. "I can pay rent or whatever."

"Grocery shopping is my absolute least favorite errand," he replied.

The whiteboard swirled with cursive. * ** _I will make you a list._** *

"Why don't you just go with me and knock what he needs into the cart?" Jessica asked.

"You have to take the dogs if you want her to go with you," Matt replied, walking over with a stack of pancakes.

* _ **Wade doesn't like me to leave the grounds.**_ *

Jessica frowned. "What does Wade have to do with you going where you want?"

"If you'd just apologize to him he wouldn't line the yard with salt," Matt sighed. "I can never tell when he does it."

She covered her mouth but not her laugh. "Sorry, just, wow. Some things never change."

"You sure you don't want a reunion?" Matt asked.

* ** _Brunch. Trish won't be wasted enough to start a fight if we do brunch._** *

Matt hesitated. "Did Ellie write something?"

"She suggested brunch," Jessica said. "You don't hear her?"

He shrugged. "Only when she says something, not like she writes on the board for me. I'll make some calls when I open the office."

 

* * *

 

"Hey, Eddie." Matt frowned. " _Vee_."

"Don't be like that man, he said he was sorry," Eddie protested, giving him a stiff hug that Matt pretended to hate. "Is that - Jessica? Holy shitballs, Girl, give me a hug!"

She embraced him and couldn't fight a smile. Eddie looked good for a guy with an alien parasite with boundary issues. "Hey, Brock. How you been?"

"Can't complain without bursting into tears and Matty hates when I do that," Eddie winked. "When can we catch up?"

"Getting the family together for brunch tomorrow," Matt answered. "Elektra's invited."

"Thanks for the warning. Is she still pissed about the Christmas tree?" Eddie hesitated.

"Not to my knowledge, but no promises," Matt shrugged.

"That's a story I want to hear," she laughed.

"Not when Bat-ears over here is listening, plausible deniability is important when you live with a mercurial ghost," Eddie grinned. "Where's this brunch going down - are we making it our yearly 'visit the old man' day?"

She shivered. "You guys still do that?"

"As the family lawyer, it's part of the gig," Matt said quietly.

"And as his brother, it's part of the gig to make sure he doesn't go by himself," Eddie added in a low growl. "Not even Elektra goes in that cursed room. You know she can pop hearts now?"

Jessica did not know that. "How do you know that?"

"It was one time and she apologized," Matt said quickly. "It doesn't matter - and you're not supposed to bring it up."

" _We'll catch up,_ " Eddie mouthed to her, miming a phone and passing her his card. He turned to Matt. "Hey, I sent a kid to Sister Maggie, she was asking some weird questions."

"What kind of questions?" Matt asked.

"Who's Sister Maggie?" Jessica asked over him.

Eddie glanced between them and Matt sighed. "I'm headed there next, I'll give her the rundown."

"Be sure you do, that nun's trying her best," Eddie warned. "And don't skimp on the story - tell her the whole thing." Matt gave him the finger and Jessica wondered who was bringing nuns into their narrative.

 

* * *

 

"I don't feel like explaining it again, but Sister Maggie is my mother. I wasn't supposed to end up with the old man, my Dad meant for me to end up at the orphanage but - it's complicated," Matt said quickly. "We don't talk about it, or acknowledge it. You deserve the backstory before you say something that makes her heart go all 'rat-a-tat' with guilt. I hate that."

"That's - "

"I know, _right_? She hates Elektra and adores Wade - like, what is life," Matt said, throwing up his hands.

"Back up," Jessica said, catching his elbow so she could steer him to the edge of the sidewalk. "Your ma's alive and she didn't come for you?"

"She's a nun, it was complicated," Matt said. "She, also, _maybe_ , had postpartum depression and tried to drown me when I was three months old - but the plan was for me to go to Saint Agnes when Dad died, not get adopted by an abusive failure of a supervillain."

"Whoa."

"Just don't bring it up, I don't like to talk about it when I'm sober and you're already messing up my schedule," Matt sighed, shaking off her hold. "I'm not making you talk about whatever shit when down when you were away so it's only fair you don't make me talk about this."

"Fine. _Whatever_."

He kissed her forehead. " _Fine_ , whatever. Thank you."

She rolled her eyes but there was a reason he was allowed to placate her. Fucking Matt Murdock with his broken eyes and constant vigilance had been her compass long before she and her foster siblings found out he was the old man's ward on paper like the rest of them.

He frowned as he stepped back. "What's that palpitation all about?"

She linked arms with him and let him take the lead again. "Just remembering when we figured out the old man was keeping you locked in the basement."

He huffed. "I was never locked in."

That was only partially true - he knew exits and hidden passages all over the building but it didn't change the lies the old man told them - and now he had a mother? "I don't have to like her, do I?"

"You don't have to do anything you don't want to, Jess," he snorted but she had a rush of emotion. There were a lot of reasons she'd decided to invade his space above all others. "Hang on." He slipped his arm from her elbow and disappeared into the trash-lined alley.

She sighed and followed him to find him kicking a vagrant's boot.

"Hey. What are you doing? You know it's Thursday, right? _Hey_."

The beard wasn't familiar but the narrow glare he sent toward Matt was like a name-tag. "Hey, Frankie."

His face flashed with recognition. "Jess?"

"You're not answering your phone," Matt scolded. "Get up, you're gross. Don't hug him - so gross - "

Jess laughed into Frank's shoulder. He was gross and smelly but she hadn't seen Castle more than a few hours at a time since he shipped out at eighteen so she let it slide. "Been a long time, asshole."

"I broke my phone, got a new one on the way," he grumbled in Matt's direction. "Was coming by this afternoon."

"Walk with us, you can shower at the church," Matt said. "We're doing brunch tomorrow."

"Ugh. You still letting Ellie make the plans?" Frank muttered, falling into step with them. " _Brunch_."

"I don't think I can handle Trish one-on-one if she's using," Jessica blurted out. Matt shook his head sharply but she'd already caught her mistake at Frank's sudden stiffening.

"She's still using? You said - "

"It's none of our business," Matt said quickly. "She knows where to come when she's ready for help. She's already RSVP'd for tomorrow and judging's not what we do."

Frank grunted under his breath and she elbowed him. "I'm totally judging you for sleeping on the street, are you really that much of a mooch that Matt doesn't let you crash on his couch?"

"I got a place, just didn't make it there yet," Frank frowned. "I didn't want to miss my VA meeting."

"You'll have time to make it after you shower," Matt said.

"Don't handle me," Frank snapped.

"Don't make me," Matt fired back.

She'd been gone too long and didn't process the swing until Frank let it fly but Matt ducked out of the way with the surreal grace he denied at all costs.

" _Boys_." A tiny nun appeared out of _nowhere_ and shocked Matt and Frank into stillness.

"Sister Maggie," Matt nodded, recovering first. "I was wondering - "

"The shower's free in the basement, you know where the donation box is for clean clothes," Maggie barked at Frank who scampered into the church. She turned to Jess with steely dark eyes. "Who's this?"

"Jessica."

The nun perked up. "The prodigal sister, honored to meet you, Ms. Jones."

"Sure," she said, shaking her hand.

"Matthew missed you most of all," Maggie stage-whispered and she wasn't sure what to think of Matt's adorable blush. This woman had no claim on teasing to that effect. "By any chance, do either of you recognize the street urchin lurking behind those bushes?"

Matt tilted his head thoughtfully. "Is that the one Eddie said was being weird?"

"Your invisible sister isn't here, is she? She might scare her off," Sister Maggie hesitated, glancing around anxiously. "She's asking questions about Mr. - "

"We don't say his name, thanks," Jessica cut her off. "What kind of questions?"

Matt frowned. "She...smells familiar. Like - "

Sister Maggie interrupted tapping his wrist. "That's enough. I'll talk to her."

Jessica took another look at the haphazardly dressed girl badly snooping from the church's courtyard. She did seem familiar but Jess didn't know any kids around here. "Maybe I should talk to her. Isn't Wade waiting on you?"

"No," Matt replied but Sister Maggie caught her intention.

"I was supposed to take him a package with some of that lotion he needs - be a dear and run it over. Your visible sister will be here when you get back," Sister Maggie said.

"I've got a PI's license, watch me not be a mooch," Jessica said when Matt hesitated. "Let me talk to the kid."

"Fine. I'll be back in twenty minutes," he said, shaking out his walking stick for solo traveling and taking the paper bag from Sister Maggie.

She immediately turned to the nun but she held up her hand, watching Matt walk away. "He'll hear us, wait until he makes the crosswalk," Maggie whispered.

Shit, how could Jess forget that?

"That child seems to think her mother's last address was - the old man's address," Sister Maggie stated.

"Shit. Sorry," she censored.

Sister Maggie raised an eyebrow. "Please tell me it's not the ghost's."

"I'm pleading the fifth until I talk to her myself. Fingers crossed it's not Ellie's - " Jessica muttered. "Not that it's any of your business."

"I'm not allowed to ask about his childhood," Sister Maggie said in a low voice. "But I hope you'll be kinder to her than the ghost or the blonde."

Jessica snorted. "If you're looking for one of us to be _nice_ , you should've stuck with Eddie."

Sister Maggie smoothed down her dress, motioning for the girl to come over. "Our last priest had to take a sabbatical after that one gave confession - he has to give three days notice to come on the grounds."

The nun's smarter than she thought.

"Amy, this is Jessica," Sister Maggie introduced her to the kid.

Jessica hadn't been gone long enough to forget Trish's original nose. "Shit."

"You're going to have to work on that," Sister Maggie sighed.

"My language is the least of our problems." Jessica muttered. Shit. "We'll need a DNA test and a bunch of papers before we're answering any of your questions."

Amy's face lit up. "You believe me?"

"Nope," she lied. But she didn't need Matt's nose to sniff out a family member.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyric tag belongs to X-Ambassadors


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some flashbacks for some of the Fam, we'll be back to the main narrative soon but here's an interlude for knitting purposes. I'm having a blast writing this and I hope it continues to be fun to read!

_angel on the floor_  
_devil at the door_  
_she knows imma let him in_

 

 

 

 

> **_Then_ **

  

 

"You're special, Matty, not that you weren't special before - "

"I'm blind, Dad, that's not the good kind of special."

"Your hearing, your sense of smell - it's a gift from God."

"A curse."

"Don't talk like that. You're going to do amazing things, Matty, but you have to be careful who knows."

"You mean the old man, don't you? I didn't talk to him on purpose."

"You didn't do anything wrong, kid."

"I can go somewhere else after school - "

"No, Matty, you're not listening. Working on the old man's building is good money and I know the crew gives you change for playing lookout but - I don't want to mess this up. The old man's going to give us one of the apartments - first floor so no more stairs for us."

"Is that why you're not boxing?"

"I'll be back in the ring before you know it but this is a good gig, kid. Just - keep your head down until I get it in writing and we won't have to worry about choosing heat or water next winter."

"I'll be more careful - "

"That's all I ask. I found this blind guy, says he can help you out over summer break so I need you to be a perfect little church mouse until we get this building up so I can afford the lessons. Deal?"

"Deal."

 

* * *

 

She glances into the nursery for the child that never was as she drags her suitcase down the hallway. Her mother promised she could keep it - not _her_ , she can't think of the dead _thing_ as a baby anymore - not a _girl_ if she never took that first breath - but nothing matters now that those nine months of binders to hide but not hurt, those months of full meals and shopping binges for booties and blankets, those nights of hopes and dreams of someone to love that loved her back -

None of it matters.

She woke up in the hospital after a three week nap - fully recovered from her 'rollerblade incident' according to the gossip columns that her mother pays very well. Nine months of hope ended in three weeks of nothing.

She doesn't know why her mother hasn't cleaned out the nursery.  She doesn't know why she's being sent away after the scandal's over.  She doesn't know how to fix anything.

It doesn't matter.

She's been the breadwinner since she was 8, so the 'not baby' shouldn't have surprised her mother since she's been aging her up for pageants and parts her whole life.

But everything's different now. She can't take back the last nine months any more than she could take back the drunken night with the stage manager. Her age didn't matter to him until after the positive test - and then it was a transaction.

Trish's whole life is a transaction to her mother, maybe that's why she's being sent away.

It doesn't matter.

 

* * *

 

"We're never talking about this again," Matt rasps out, arterial blood still dripping from the healed slash in his throat.

"Shit - what the hell were you thinking?"

He can still feel Venom's presence but at least he's outside of him now - hovering over his skin instead of underneath. "Back off, Buddy."

_*Eddie would never forgive me if I let you die.*_

"Vee - stop it - Matty, hey, you're all right, right? All good?" Eddie asks in a panicked voice, raising him to sit up. "Because Ellie's losing her shit and - "

"Elektra - " Matt calls out as his pulse settles back into a normal - human - healed - rhythm. "El."

She gasps, a shattered sound that makes him reach out his hand. Eddie slaps it down. "Christ - she nearly decapitated you, man."

"Matthew - "

"You were asleep. You were sleepwalking. I didn't mean to wake you up - " Matt blurts out. "I'm sorry."

"I - I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you - " Elektra whispers.

 _"I am **not** sorry, this was a very exciting night,_" Venom says.

Eddie lets out a frustrated noise. "Shut up, you're not helping - "

Matt shudders and wraps his arms around Elektra. "No, he - it's invasive and weird and I never want it to happen again - but he helped. Thank you both."

Elektra leans back and wipes blood on his face in an attempt to clean him up. "We should come up with rules."

"I'm not allowed upstairs, the old man - " Matt starts but she covers his mouth.

"We know that, you always use the secret passages your dad built in the walls - this isn't about you.  It's about sleepwalking protocols - Vee probably wouldn't have noticed Trish crying out - she cries all the time," Eddie says, slightly less hysterical despite the bloody mess.

She must hear her name, or finally have the guts to step out of her room.  "Jesus, what happened?"

"Can you please take Matthew back to the basement so we can clean up?" Elektra asks.

 

* * *

 

"I killed my stepfather," Frank states. Wade glances between Matt and Trish before holding up his hand for a high-five. Frank blinks at him and it isn't because of his grotesquely scarred skin. But he slaps his palm just to not leave the guy hanging.

"Did he deserve it?" Trish asks, her eyes bright with curiosity instead of the fear he expects from the pristine girl.

"Yeah, I didn't kill him for fun. But it was kinda fun," he grins but Trish doesn't balk, rolling her eyes.

"Matty will get mad if I high-five you again," Wade whispers.

Matt shrugs, "Just try to stick to the 'deserved it' part and we'll all be fine. Eddie give you the rundown?"

Frank doesn't believe most of it but he's got nowhere else to go. He needs a plan. He needs time to make a plan. "Old guy is an asshole, wants to teach me how to kill and get paid for it."

"Nope, he wants to teach you to kill so he can get paid for it. If we try and run, whoever sold you to him will find and bring you back," Wade said.

"Nobody _sold_ me to him," Frank growls.

Wade snickers. "Gotta be a reason you aren't locked up, Pal. Where's your ma?"

His grandparents dropped him off in a brand new truck. Goddamn.

"Don't panic. We're all in the same boat, except Matt. He's just here until his dad comes back," Trish says quickly but she's not that great of an actress.

The door opens slowly and Eddie steps in with the pair of brunettes and paper bags. His stomach growls and Wade takes it for an invitation to move to his side on the couch.

"You seem like a nice enough guy - not a crybaby - we hate those," he says seriously. "But don't fuck this up for the rest of us if you can't stick with the rules. The old man's going to order you to shoot me in the face tomorrow and the longer you hesitate, the longer we'll have to spend in the water tank - "

"Is it Wednesday already? Ugh, hate the tank," Jessica cuts in, holding out a greasy sack of french fries. "Maybe I'll shoot you in the face instead to get a pass."

"Girls don't get to play with guns," Trish mutters, yanking Jess by her belt loops to take possession of the last bag of hot snacks.

Matt sighs and Elektra drapes her arms over his shoulders possessively, cutting her eyes at him. Fuck aliens and girls that punch like freight trains - she's the one he's going to keep his eyes on.

 

* * *

 

Trish digs her fingers into Wade's arm and leans back against Jessica's steady support as they watch Matt fight off the swarm of red-robed attackers. _Ninjas_.  Matt's fighting like a ninja.  A blind - 

"The fuck - are you -" Eddie manages first.  Nobody's even seen Matt since the service.

"It's not about me - help - " Matt says as if he's not picking off ninjas like a goddamn professional - he's a fucking junior in college - he's pre-fucking-law while she's doing toothpaste commercials in fake teeth - he's the sane untouched by the old man's evil one of them - the fucking good one - not a fighter, _not Matt, too._

She loses focus on the battle and her secret-keeping-asshole brother to look at the smoke from the humming crematorium inside the cemetery walls.

"These guys aren't right - " Wade says, swinging into action as a cluster of ninjas turn their way.

"They're dead," Venom snarls, in place of Eddie, grinning with permission for carnage but waiting for something - they're all waiting -

"They're here for Elektra, don't let them get to her body - " Matt says in a spray of blood from a busted nose as he ducks a narrow punch. Gunfire lights up the street - Frank's here - and Wade pulls his pair of swords from his hoodie with a flourish of glee or rage - all the same to Wade.

"Lying motherfucker - " Jessica snaps, jumping into the fray as Venom crunches his mouth around his first snack of the night.

Shit shit - Trish isn't ready for this - sure, her reflexes are still tip-top but she's not risking her manicure for this level of battle. But she can protect Ellie since the ninja assholes haven't made it to the gates yet.

"They can't get to her - " Matt cries out with a broken sound and hits the dirt with a thump that sends tentacles and swords in all directions as she lunges over the fence in a fluid leap.

The plump gravedigger from the office looks up at her in surprise, sliding a set of headphones from his ears. "Miss Walker? The priest already left, your sister's been - "

A flood of black swirling smoke rises from the chimney and she knows - _Elektra's gone_. She's not sure the smoke should be covering the sky like that but who cares about a full moon - the chaos behind the gates stops in a sharp silence so it's over.

"We won't have her remains for a few days, I'm sorry if you had the wrong idea," the man says nervously, glancing over as the smoke becomes wind and swoops behind the fence.

"Sorry to bother you," she grins blankly and waits for him to turn away before rushing back over the fence.

Jessica reaches out when she lands and brings her into the small circle apart from the piles of mutilated and half-eaten bodies. She shivers at the sight of Frank, blood smeared in his buzz-cut crouched at Matt's side on the ground.

"It's done," she whispers.

"You think? Sky's fucking black," Wade growls, shoving his hands in the air.

"No - she's not the Black Sky - she's Ellie," Matt sobs suddenly, struggling in Frank's grip.  "She's not the Black Sky - "

Trish doesn't know what that means but the wind doesn't let up and the sky doesn't clear.  

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyric tag belongs to 'The Man Who'.


	3. Chapter 3

_Just a little thing_  
_Buried in the other things_

 

 Of course Wade didn't warn her that Matt was coming over, but at least he pretended it was an ambush until he handed over the delivery.  She was slightly disappointed that Jessica wasn't with him but she had her chance to question him before tomorrow's brunch.

"Jessica's back alone?" Trish asked Matt after Wade disappeared into his bathroom to 'exfoliate like a rock star'.

He gave her a curious look. "Yeah. We had the whole 'no significant others' talk last night."

She didn't want to speak out of turn but hell - she needed to know. "I was a mess the last few times I saw her, I'm not denying that, but - there was a guy. A bad guy."

Wade stuck his head out of the bathroom. "Bad guy? Are we planning a mission?"

"She said some shit went down. That she had some therapy, but she didn't mention - " Matt started, ignoring Wade.

"Oh _that_ guy, he's dead as fuck. Didn't even earn a mark on the old man's scorecard," Wade said, ducking back into the bathroom.

"Wade!" Matt barked, a notch paler than she liked. He might be Daredevil, the Kitchen's homegrown hero, but he hadn't been the same since Elektra died and that was years ago. Matt was a crier and she hated it.

"I hope he's dead. I didn't like how he made her act. She wasn't herself, she wasn't - " she cut herself off. "Where is she staying - "

"How he ' **made** ' her act?" Matt picked out. " _Explain_."

Wade stormed out without his shirt but gratefully wearing pants.  " _Ugh_ , you're so snippy about shit that you don't hear first- he was a telepathic asshole and it was totally self-defense. You should stay out of her business - there's a reason she didn't come home until now," Wade said, stern. He shoved the bottle into Matt's hand. "Do my back and apologize for being a nosy dick."

"I will _not_ apologize for something everyone is already aware of," Matt replied with a pronounced frown. He squeezed out a dollop of lotion and smoothed it over Wade's scarred back that he couldn't reach. "She seems steady."

Wade snickered. "Matty never got the 'girl code' - he seriously thought he knew all the sisters' secrets but not even Ellie gave up the good stuff."

"Why are you pestering Trish anyway?" Matt asked.

"You have noticed I'm in his apartment, right?" Trish sighed.

Matt frowned and she thought for a second he was playing dumb until he cocked his hip toward her. "Can you get my phone so I don't smear this shit on my pants?"

She slid the phone from his pocket and accidentally swiped to answer so she raises it to her ear. "Matthew's phone."

"Burn," Wade cackled.

_"Trish? Hey. I thought he was going to Wade's."_

"We were having a Top Chef marathon so we can hate on whatever Matt orders for brunch tomorrow and sound fancy," Trish replied honestly.

"You can't fake a refined palate like this," Wade said, sticking his tongue out. "Aw, don't be like that - " he protested when Matt stopped his 'lotioning."

"You're all good, I'm offended and am going to wash my hands," Matt said dramatically. She rolled her eyes. Wade and Matt brought out the worst in each other and there would be a fistfight in the future if one of the other brothers didn't turn up before code red.

_"It's better that I got you anyway, tell him to go home and you come meet me at the church. You know he has a Ma?"_

"Oh yeah, and now that you're back and I'm clean six months - I'm going to tell you all about it," Trish said, getting the sobriety question out of the way.

_"Good because I have questions - but I need you to put your big girl panties on and get over here because there's some serious shit happening and the brothers aren't in the loop, this is your thing."_

Shit. "What kind of - "

_"I don't think you ever told anyone but me and El."_

That could actually be a few things but nothing that would earn this level of weird from Jess. "Sure, but the nun knows I'm coming, right? We have some basic differences of opinion," she added.

"Sister Maggie is trying her best," Wade said. "Don't get Jess on the wrong side of this."

" _I don't give a shit about her, Trish._ _There's a fucking kid looking for her bio mom over here - all blatant about it - and this is an orphanage, right? Not really a cool place for a punk kid to be asking questions like that - plus this nun I'm not allowed to punch._ "

"On the way," Trish said, ending the call and pushing the phone into Wade's hand. "Can you get Matt home and - fuck, call an emergency Fam meeting at his place in an hour?  I need to see the files."

"For who?" Matt asked from the hallway. "Was that Jess? Is it about that weird kid Eddie found?"

Wade frowned, shrugging into a hoodie. "Is Vee stalking Spider-Man again?"

Matt stiffened. "Why the hell would Eddie know Peter?"

Wade cracked his knuckles. "How the hell do you know Peter? Go, Trish - me and Matty need to have a conversation. You don't need to be here for this."

God.

 

* * *

 

" _The Lord is my shepherd,_ " Sister Maggie said, abruptly standing up from the bench and walking to the sidewalk. The doberman trio sat down at her approach.

"Who's walking those dogs?" Amy whispered.

"No comment," Jess replied. It had been the only response she could trust herself to make and the girl hadn't snapped yet. Yet.

"Red, Yellow, Green," Sister Maggie said and the dogs stood up one at a time to let her attach leashes to their collars.

"I didn't know they had names," Jess said as Elektra's cool presence joined them.

Sister Maggie was openly uncomfortable but seemed accustomed to holding the dogs. "I'm going to take them to see the children while you talk."

There was a shift in the air and Jessica saw a string of beads and a cross - Matt's rosary - suspended beside her. The girl gasped but the nun nodded respectfully and walked away.

"Did you steal that from his room?" Jessica asked. She assumed the ghost shrugged so she let it go.

"They have a history, Sister Maggie didn't like it when Ellie possessed her for trespassing a couple of years ago," Trish said, coming from the opposite direction.

Jessica embraced her instinctively - the clear eyes and neat makeup enough to reassure her for now that she was sober. They all needed her to be sober right now. "Possessed? She can do that? I _really_ need to talk to Eddie," she said into Trish's shoulder.

"She wrecked a Neo-Nazi march last year - it's all over YouTube, shit was wild," Trish muttered, her eyes going wide to match the girl's when she spotted her. " _Oh my God._ "

"Right?" Amy replied. "Um. Hi. _So_. My mother's really my grandma, huh?"

"What?" Trish whispered. "Who - "

The girl crossed her arms. "My 'mother's name is Dorothy. She said her first daughter died of a drug overdose and I'm her second chance."

Trish inhaled sharply. "No - that's - "

Jessica knew this was the straw-camel moment. "Trish - we'll do tests before you have to believe anything outright, okay - "

"I have proof, like, a lot of it. I'm pretty sure she sent some people to kill me if they can't catch me," Amy said, holding up a flash drive.

Elektra was not a friendly ghost - hell, she had never been friendly so the USB was swiftly snatched and floated out of the girl's reach.

"Hey!"

"Relax," Jess said. "Both of you."

" _Relax_? Do you know how hard it was to get that stuff - " Amy started winding up into oddly familiar hysteria. What if she really was Trish's kid?

"If you're really in danger, our dead sister's the best protection," Trish said suddenly. " _Granted_ you're telling the truth because if you're not, you'll regret coming here."

"I already regret coming here - "

"Matt's getting the family files, we stalked and burned all our family secrets years ago," Trish said.

Jess smiled at the reminder. Burning shady research labs was totally therapeutic and Trish's blood tests had some of the same tainted meds so they tag-teamed the burning.

Frank cleared his throat, clean with a neatly clipped beard and a dog at his knee.  Shit, Jess forgot all about him. He held out a raggedy laptop. "Ellie says you need this, does Sister Maggie know she's here?"

"So the ghost lady's totally okay with everyone around here?" Amy blurted out, throwing up her hands.

Frank blinked. "Trish, why does this kid look like you before the nose job?"

"Where did you get this?" Jess asked, sitting down and opening the computer. Elektra pushed the flash drive into the port.

"I signed it out in Matt's name," Frank said. "And the kid?"

The dog nosed at his palm with a whine, tugging the leash toward the sidewalk.

"Go to your meeting and meet us after," Jess said, remembering they found him sleeping in an alley.

Frank frowned. The dog yipped once and he sighed. "Sister bullshit, fine. Be nice to the nun, seriously - Ellie, you listening?" The rosary laced through her invisible fingers so the rude gesture couldn't be misinterpreted. "I'm telling Matt about your blasphemy."

"God, I'm better off letting those camouflage assholes kill me," Amy muttered.

Frank flinched. "Huh, they looking for _you_?  Thought they were Wade's people - killed six of them yesterday. Only two today." He pulled a handgun and held it out to her.

Trish snatched it before the girl could stop gaping at him. "Get out of here with that shit, you're in the Lord's house."

"So much blasphemy," Jessica snickered but a folder opened and - goddamn birth certificates - _plural_. Mother, unnamed, deceased - mother, Patricia Walker, child stillborn - Mother, Dorothy Walker, child, girl - " _Fuck_."

Trish turned to her and she closed the laptop and met her questioning eyes. "Fuck?"

"Yeah."

"You got a key to Matt's house?" Trish asked her, flushing suddenly.

Jess glanced toward the spot of cold air. "Ellie does, I'm sure. She'll need a place to stay."

Sister Maggie reappeared with the two remaining dogs tugging on their leashes.

Amy rushed over to her. "Do you seriously trust these people?"

The nun didn't hesitate. "I trust Matthew, so yes, that means trusting his family no matter their manners. They can keep you safe, even if some of them are terrifying." She held out the leashes and released them into midair, meaning Elektra's hand, with a step back. "You have my number and a bed here if you don't want their - "

"I was fourteen - " Trish blurted out. "Complications in a private, scheduled c-section put me in a coma and they couldn't save the baby. My mother said she never took a breath and she sent me away days after I got released from the hospital - "

"That bitch stole your baby before she sold you to the old man," Jessica stated. "She probably planned the whole thing."

"She did," Amy whispered with those wide Walker sitcom eyes. "I've been running away for years but I didn't raid her files until this time. I just wanted to - "

"You can hug it out later, but no tears - funerals and jail are the only excuses for tears," Jessica announced, standing up. "Nice to meet you, Sister Maggie - your existence is tentatively accepted and we'll bring the girl back if she wants to come."

Trish surprised her, reaching out and squeezing Amy's hand. "Dorothy will never touch you again."

"Please plot murder elsewhere, thank you," Sister Maggie shooed them toward the edge of the courtyard.  

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyric tag belongs to Jimmy Eat World.


	4. Chapter 4

_I'll be right there_  
_But you'll have to grab my throat and lift me in the air_  
_If you need anyone_

 

 

  
"Ready to meet the rest of the crazy?" Jessica asked the girl who forced her eyes away from Trish's back to nod. The kid had guts and she was going to need them.

"My aunt is a ghost, how much crazier can it get?" Amy replied.

"You'll regret that question, just remember what the nun said - nobody else will keep you as safe as us. And you're family now," Trish said with a firm nod.

Matt's expression was bright with surprise when they turned the corner so she knew he heard enough. He said something to Wade that sent him in the opposite direction and stole her reunion with the final brother for the moment. But she'd seen him a few times in the past few years unlike everyone else.

She owed him a thank you for not telling her business all over town, but she doubted it would last now that she was back. She was going to have to come clean.

Matt held open the door to his apartment for the dogs and sized up Amy with his senses, flaring his nostrils and slanting his head like a curious cat. "Hello, I'm Matt."

"Oh. You're blind?" the kid blurted out with an immediate flush of regret.

"This is Amy," Trish said, solemn.

"It's great to meet you. Welcome." He flinched slightly. "Please lower your voice, El - thank you, no, absolutely not yet - go check the new rooms. Yes."

Jessica glanced at Trish when Elektra's invisible fingers left marks in his hair as she left with the dogs. "New rooms?"

"Old man's running out of money and he's been selling off space in the building for years," he shrugged. "Can't really expose strangers to Elektra so I've been buying it up, sort of. It's a whole legal thing, but it's a band-aid on a gut-shot solution. Come on."

She wasn't sure about going inside the main building without dealing with a shit-ton of trauma. Matt's office slash apartment had always been their safe space, sealed off by the old man to hide Matt away but giving them a haven by default - the other rooms in the building were their jail cells and torture chambers passed off as bedrooms and training areas.

"It's not whatever you're thinking," Matt said, taking her elbow and steering her outside again. "The renovations removed all access to the back side of the building. Old man's in a lead-lined, sealed room on the back side with one way in and out - for safety reasons."

"Of course," she muttered.

He addressed Amy again. "You came looking for Trish, how did you know about Eddie?"

"She's - " Trish started but Matt tipped his head to pause her.

"El filled me in, I'm just making sure she's comfortable," he said. "Our family's not conventional."

"Mom - Dorothy - had files on all of the siblings. Eddie's a journalist, Wade and Frank are soldiers so I wasn't going there - Elektra's dead and Jessica lives out of state. You weren't in there," Amy said.

Matt nodded, pleased. "Good."

"He's family, he's our brother," Trish said.

"I'm just the lawyer on paper, but I grew up here, too. I made a point to have the old man's name taken off all the documentation after the fact and he never put my name on anything he shared with his partners," Matt shrugged, leading them over to a neighboring doorway that wasn't there when it was their home. "Dining room."

"There wasn't a door in the dining room," Jessica said.

"Renovations," Matt replied. The door opened from the inside. "Tore out everything, drywall, flooring - it doesn't ping any of my PTSD triggers so we'll see if it works for the rest of you."

She took in the room and it definitely didn't look like any room she remembered growing up. Dark, polished hardwood floors with a round dining room table and cushioned chairs in varied sizes for their adult selves.

Trish whistled, drawn to the framed photographs lining the walls. Jessica had taken some of these when she was learning photography and she didn't want to look at the images of their younger, trapped lives when they have to be on good behavior for the kid.

"I think this is a picture of my Dad," Matt said, catching on to their notice. Jessica had never seen Battlin' Jack Murdock's wedding photo but Sister Maggie looked up at him adoringly in her white dress. Shit.

"So, am I out of turn to ask if Elektra's going to possess me if she's got the balls to do it to a nun?" Amy asked, taking one of the larger seats and curling her legs underneath her.

"Who told you that? Whoever told you that is out of turn," Matt frowned.

Trish raised her hand. "I did, because Jess needed to know."

Matt softened his voice when he answered the kid's question. "Ellie knows you now so you're not a threat. She did **not** know Sister Maggie when she came over the first time."

Jessica whistled. "You didn't tell her?"

"I didn't tell anyone. I was having some issues, El wasn't speaking to me at the time. It's best we forget it ever happened," Matt said. "She uses better discretion when it comes to my personal guests."

Amy didn't look reassured.

"She's never done it to someone in the family and you're part of that now. Collectively, we have lots of exes and she keeps her pranks non-invasive unless someone's trying to kill us," Trish said.

"I'd like to mention that the three of us here do not default to murder. You have a lot of options and nobody's hands are clean but if you want to pursue this the legal way and focus on punishing your grandmother to the full extent of the law and God's will - "

" _Meaning he'll make sure there is adequate suffering_ ," Elektra wrote on the tabletop in swirling marker that faded after a few moments. Of course Matt would accommodate their invisible sister and she made a note of the tiny dog beds near one of the seats.

Matt shifted toward Trish. "She gets to decide, that's still what you want?"

Jess glanced at her. "When did you have that conversation?"

"Reminder, Amy - Matt hears everything," Trish said. "Her hands are clean, I can't be the one to put blood on them."

"Keeping you safe is our top priority, but Dorothy _will_ pay," Matt said. "We'll tell you before we make any moves but for right now, can you agree to stay with one of us under our protection?"

"Of course - " Trish started but Matt held up his hand.

"She needs to say it, don't start making decisions for her," Matt said.

"I've been staying at Wade's," Trish blurted out and Matt flinched.

"Why - "

"Because you hear everything and sometimes I cry and don't want a fucking hug," Trish snapped. "You don't have a TV and Ellie only watches Korean soap operas and - "

"I was going to ask why I hadn't seen you there, but keep going if you want. At least it explains why he's been visiting me instead of inviting me to his place," Matt said.

Amy knocked her knuckles against the table. "Sorry to interrupt but before you guys start bickering again - yes, I want protection and I love Korean soaps." She tossed a crumpled five on the table. "Will you be my lawyer?"

" _Family doesn't pay_ ," Elektra wrote on the table as the bill smooths out and slides back to the girl's side of the table. " _Do you like K-Pop?_ "

Amy grinned brightly and Jessica realized she'd lost the favorite aunt spot to a dead woman.

 

* * *

 

"I'll kill - " Frank started but Trish cleared her throat. Her brothers were a _lot_.

"Please censor all references to homicide around juvenile guests," Matt called from the other room. Amy snickered, she was entirely too entertained by her new family. Trish needed it to stay that way because she was planning an epic meltdown when she got alone time. She has a kid. She has a daughter. Alive. The fuck.

"Don't quote his divorce settlement, you'll ruin his appetite," Wade said, patting Frank's head to patronize him fully.

"Separation, we're trying it again," Frank said with a withering look. "Don't make me - "

" _Guys_ ," Eddie interrupted. "That's so awful, Trish - fuck that woman. Amy, are you all right? Do you think she's looking for you?"

"We're on top of it," Wade and Frank said with matching nods.

"All of you guys are scary as hell, but I feel a lot less like I'm going to die than I did this morning," Amy said. "I've got a lawyer and a mother that feeds me and hasn't made me change into high heels - I'm totally having a good day."

"You're going to help Matty with the research, right?" Frank asked Eddie.

"Already on it, but he says we have to do family time before I can check the results," Eddie replied.

"What's your thing? The nun said you scare the priest," Amy asked.

Trish winced. "You sure you wanna ask right now?"

Matt walked out of the kitchen with a tray of canned soda, beer and bottled water. "I'd like a word with him, if he's got the _balls_."

Everyone but Amy winced at that, she was still entirely too entertained.

Eddie opened his mouth but Venom's darkness swirled over him and he curled his tongue out to test the air and sneer at Matt.

Matt sighed softly. " _Vee_. He's just a kid. You trust me to know the difference, right?" Oh wow, she had no idea what this was about.

Venom snarled but Matt didn't flinch.

"You remember Eddie - hell, _any_ of us - at seventeen, right? The kid needs to figure himself out. You get that, right?" Matt paused. "What's going on, Vee? You need a fight or a zip to space - "

He loomed suddenly, giant and formless and Trish instinctively put her hand out when Amy gasped. Everyone settled when Matt simply raised his head to accommodate Venom's shift in size. He narrowed his mouth into a hard line. "Say it to my face."

" _Coward_ ," Venom hissed.

"Vee! Damn, are you showing out because you aren't the center of attention?" Jessica asked, stepping in with several bags of takeout and the dogs trickling in and freezing uncertainly at the edge of the table.

Venom shifted his attention. "Come at me, you dead - "

"Not in the house - " Matt snapped and Eddie reappeared in a fluid blink, glaring at the space beside Jessica.

"We're trying not to scare the new kid and you're starting a fight?" Eddie asked.

"Vee started it - you need to have a talk with him if he's going to be talking shit about Matty's stuff," Frank warned. "Later."

"Wow. I definitely feel better about choosing to stay here, no offense, Trish," Amy said quietly.

 

* * *

 

  
"What did you mean when you said you had some issues? Because Frank and Wade made it seem like it was more than that," Jessica asked once they had settled their new niece with one dog on the couch and quietly fucked out the day's angst.

"Wade and Trish made it seem like you had some issues of your own," he pouted.

"We aren't getting into a pissing contest over who has the right to keep secrets. I'm not ready to talk about mine."

He didn't take the invitation to tell her to fuck off and she had a rush of regret. What did she miss?

"I almost died. I was disappointed it didn't take so I tried to finish it and it turned into this huge thing that it didn't need to be."

She reached past him to flip on the lamp he never used and surveyed him in the light. She should know all his scars but - there were too many to map - so many more than the last time she fucked him in the day. "Matt."

"I had a hard time."

"And you just decided to handle it yourself?"

"I'm Daredevil," he stated.

She processed that. "The vigilante with the horns? What the fuck - you're a lawyer, you're supposed to - "

"I'm supposed to do what? All the friends I've made outside of this house hate my fucking guts now because I don't - "

"That's bullshit - "

He laughed and it was dry and wrong. "Sure, Jess."

"Matty - "

"Don't."

"You're telling me none of these assholes knew you were almost dead?"

"Sister Maggie found me, everyone else thought I was dead. Even Ellie couldn't find me - I was that fucking dead inside that she couldn't find me - it took weeks before I gave her a number."

"Whose number?"

"Does it matter?"

She inhaled. "Fuck yes."

"She couldn't find you and I wouldn't let her keep looking. Frank's wife figured it out around the same time and everything hit the fan."

She leaned forward and braced his shoulders, holding him flat against the bed. "Matt."

"I have failsafes in place, everyone would - "

"I'm going to punch you in the face if you try and say we'd be okay without you. The fuck happened, Matt? How were you almost - "

"I pissed off the wrong crime boss. I was in over my head before I knew I was in it at all. Lost my law partner and my best friend - lost everything - " he deflated when she released her hands. "They left me for dead outside of a Catholic shelter out in Chelsea. Sister Maggie - she'd been quietly looking for me since Dad disappeared and the nuns brought me to her. She got me back on my feet, told me who she was and I just - did not take it well. I didn't take it at all. She saved my life."

Jessica couldn't breathe. "You asked for me, out of everyone. You needed me and - "

"Hey - "

She shook off his hands. "No. There are so many things he took from me - it's - I should have - "

"There's nothing you could have done. I needed - shit, Jess, it took losing everything to make me understand how much I have. I lost myself."

She shivered and let him touch her, pulling him close. "Me, too. I - "

"You're here now and hopefully I'll have a little longer before anyone tells you more stories about what a fuck-up I am."

She kissed him. "Not to me. You - I'll tell you everything one day, I swear - but - "

"Let's leave it there for tonight," he hummed against her lips. "The past doesn't matter if we don't let it."

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyric tag belongs to Twenty-One Pilots.


	5. Chapter 5

 

_Just a man's make up, fake love, make 'em all laugh_  
_Come on, someone, take off your mask_  
_It's nice to meet_

 

 

 

> **THEN**

 

  
"Don't freak out."

Wade holds his breath but he is most definitely going to freak out. He's tied down to a bed with no mattress and only has a leg and a half to stand on at the moment. Tiny fingers slide the blindfold down and Wade squints at the kid, probably around his own age, with vacant eyes despite his confidence in finding and unlocking the straps. "Who are you?"

"Matt. I live downstairs but the old man doesn't want us to interact. He's asleep and I cut the power to the camera."

"How?" Wade whispers. "Are you - "

"Better to talk downstairs, your leg's... _weird_ ," he frowns, his fingers stilling on the last strap. "We have to go through the vent so you'll have to crawl most of the way but - are you hurt?"

"Crawling's doable," Wade replies, too curious now to be wary.

Matt hums and frees his last limb. "I'll bring you back before dawn but you'll have to redo the straps - I can't get caught up here and we can never let the old man know about the passages."

He clasps the kid's hand firmly. "Teach me everything you know."

"Only if you return the favor. Quiet and quick - okay?"

 

* * *

 

"What happened to him?" Trish hisses, shoving Frank out of the way to see why Matt's crumpled and bloody on the floor. Shit, Matt's completely out of it under the mess of bruising. Even if his eyes worked, they're too swollen to open.

"Ellie ran away," Frank mumbles.

Trish glares at him. "She's in her room - the light's still on so the camera's still on. What does that have to do with - "

"Old man probably thinks Matty helped her. These suits brought her back," he managed, hoarse. "If I didn't have the window room, I wouldn't have heard it but - I found him like this. I couldn't get down here until - "

Jessica and Wade stumble out of the vent and go completely still like matching feral animals.

"Ellie says she can't come down tonight but she didn't say - " Jessica whispers as Wade scrambles across the floor on his hands and knees.

"No no no no _no_ \- that stupid asshole was supposed to wait - " Wade chants, smacking their hands away and picking him up like a limp doll.

"Don't move him - "

"Wait for what?"

"Everybody check the secret spots - this isn't about Ellie - this is my fault," Wade says, vibrating with rage or worry as he carries Matt to the bathroom and kicks the shower on.

Trish tries to follow but the door slams and they're shut out. Jessica gasps and catches her attention, pulling a stack of thick yellow folders from the underside of a cabinet shelf.

"He got our files from the old man," Frank realizes.

Matt's voice is like a siren through the closed door. " _No - no, he didn't catch me - I - where's Elektra?_ "

" _Upstairs_ \- "

_"I thought I heard her making a run - tried to distract - tell me she didn't run away, they'll kill her if - "_

_"Dunno, but she's fine, she's upstairs and you're - "_

_"My hands, how many - do I still have fingers? I can't feel my fingers, Wade -_ "

Jessica grabs her wrist and pulls her over to the corner where Frank's holding a file labeled _Murdock, Matt_.

"He'll never forgive us," Trish says and they both stare at her.

The bathroom door opens. "Frankie, can you give us a hand? You two - get him some clothes. His fingers are all busted up, so we have to go through the files together. He wants someone to read them into a recorder and make copies so he can get them back in the old man's desk."

"Wait - so if he didn't get caught stealing this and he wasn't helping Ellie - " Jessica starts.

"Later," Trish says.

 

* * *

 

They were all in correspondence courses for their education and they take turns completing each others assignments on a regimented schedule so they get equal time out at night. The college applications and untethered social security numbers are all at Matt's insistence.

Jess doesn't really get it until Matt brings out envelopes, wine glasses and a bottle of champagne. Wade makes the announcement, and she _really_ doesn't get it but she takes the glass and her handout.

"Matty's eighteen tomorrow so we're having our long overdue come to Jesus talk," Wade says.

"It's going to be dramatic as hell and I'd like everyone to be on the same page," Matt sighs. "Not the birthday part, but what comes along with it."

"The birthday part should have been passed along to us years ago, why didn't we know your birthday?" Trish asks, visibly restraining Elektra from interrupting the two _alleged_  oldest of them from their circuit.

"Old man doesn't know my birthday," Matt says. "Wade and I have been working out the old man's scam for a long time and it's important."

"The fuck you say?" Frank whispers.

Wade glares at him, bare-faced and dead-eyed. "We had to play the long game and this started _way_ before you got here."

"Matt, what is he talking about?" Jess asks.

"Old man lost the game," Wade says. "Sure, he got his immortality but not his health."

Elektra freezes. "Are you saying - "

"He made a deal with the devil and he lost," Matt says, holding out his glass of champagne. "Tomorrow, the old man's not going to die and we'll be free."

"I don't see how - " Jess hesitates.

"He's going to be dying *forever*, for eternity - fucker's going to _rot_ ," Wade says, clinking glasses with Matt and slinging his arm around his shoulders.

Matt clears his throat, uncomfortable. "He made his own bed, he has to suffer the consequences - but we don't. We all have our documentation and you'll find your PO box key in there along with whatever responses you were waiting on. I got into Columbia."

Elektra lets out a betrayed sigh. "Traitor!"

"I got into some others, but I want to go there," Matt says.

Jess isn't eighteen - she hadn't processed that things would change this much no matter how many boxes she clicked on an application form.

Ellie snatches her wrist and Trish's with her free hand. "We are all too pretty for school right now - we should take a year off."

"After tomorrow - we can do whatever we want," Wade says.

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyric tag belongs to Oliver Riot.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tiny update _(and extension on chapter count because I need more finishing room)_. Thank so much to everyone that's been keeping up - my muses have been busy elsewhere lately but this fic is humming along just fine! 
> 
> ♥

_Then she pulled at my stitches one by one,_  
_looked at my insides clicking her tongue and said_  
_"This will all have to come undone"_

 

 

Jessica and Amy watched in silence as Matt stood by the door with his briefcase and Elektra's invisible fingers adjusted his tie and cleaned his glasses before replacing them on his nose.

"Thank you. I'll be back after court, everyone behave," Matt said, turning to leave. The dogs barked their understanding and followed him out.

"That's so weird. Is she going with him to court?" Amy whispered.

"No idea, but I have a feeling Ellie has a life apart from Matt," she shrugged. "She's not actually a ghost, you know?"

Amy took a swallow of coffee but she looked much better today after a few hours of sleep. "She tried to explain it but Yellow kept trying to eat the marker. She's worried I have some kind of power that Dorothy wants. I take it that's why the 'old man' adopted all of you?"

"Sort of. Elektra's a special case," Jessica said.

"From the pictures in the other room, it looked like she was Matt's girlfriend. Is she okay with - " Amy raised one eyebrow of interrogation.

Jessica flipped her the middle finger. "Ellie can blow me."

"Come on, tell me something," Amy snickered.

"Old man didn't claim Matt as one of his kids, at least not to us, so he was the only single boy any of us knew outside of the family since we weren't allowed out of the house," Jessica started, flopping back in her seat. "He was always Ellie's, she was determined. But Matt - he wanted his lawyer thing, a real life and things got bumpy between them when we flipped eighteen. She stalked some of his college flings - he beat up a couple of guys that made her cry but - we all forgot that our lives are not 'conventional'. Ninja cult came after Ellie, the same one that sold her to the old man in the first place - and they got her. Dead, sure, but they got her anyway. Tried to resurrect her to lead them but - "

"You burned her body but her soul remains," Amy finished solemnly. "She told me that part."

"Matt didn't tell the rest of us at first, he thought he was going crazy but whatever the ninjas did bound her soul here indefinitely." She remembered what he'd told her last night about his friends outside of the family and wondered if he’d actually tried to explain his invisible ex to them. "It was her destiny, she says, so dying didn't change it."

"Oh wow. That sucks."

"Yeah, but she makes the best of it. I can't believe Matt gave her dogs - but I also can't believe she possesses nuns for shits and giggles."

Amy shrugged, tugging on her sleeves. "I think it's, kind of, awesome that he lets her hang out. It must limit his guest list. She said the Venom thing's mad at Matt because of something she did."

"Don't know, but Vee's always been a moody bastard. He's sensitive," Jessica admitted. "I'm going to have to do some digging on that myself. I think I missed more than I thought while I was away."

The kid relaxed a tic. "Cool. I'll tag in on your catch up. I want - I think I need to know what I'm getting into. Elektra says she'll help me hide if I need to start from scratch."

Jessica nodded, thumping her hand instead of a reassuring squeeze. "She will, but it might be better if you ask me or Matty for that because you might find a lot of dead bodies if you ever decide to look back."

"Noted," Amy whispered. "So, what's your plan?"

"We wait. Someone will turn up soon - my money's on Trish."

"Do you think she's mad I didn't stay with her?" Amy asked, meeting her gaze instead of avoiding eye contact. She had a lot to learn.

Jessica felt like she was walking into a trap. "Disappointed, maybe, not mad. None of us are what you'd call 'parent material."

"Speak for yourself, our daddy's great - where's Uncle Matt?" a small boy walked in with Green on a leash and a girl - sister - following with Red. "Hi!"

Jessica recognized the woman a second too late - _oh_. Frank's wife. "Hey, Maria, right? I remember you," she recovered, offering her hand. Maria snorted and pulled her into a hug.

"You _better_ remember - I promised Frank I'd be nice to one sibling other than Matthew and Wade is on my last nerve."

"Uncle Wade is the * **best** *, he gives us all the candy and Red Bull, have you ever had Red Bull?  I'm Frank Jr. and this is Lisa, is your name Amy?  We don't have any cool cousins - " the boy started.

"Oh God," Jessica panicked under her breath.

"Venom ate our neighbor's dog. He's our least favorite uncle," Lisa confided.

"Why did he eat the dog?" Amy asked.

"It was a mean dog, he bit the mailman and scared Mom," Frankie answered. "But not as much as Vee scared Mom."

"They'll wind down," Maria promised. "Frank said we should go into the other room, is he delusional again or - "

Jessica refilled her coffee and led the crowd outside. "Nah, Matt opened it up for us yesterday. Is Ellie with you?"

"Who knows," Maria said. "She's definitely my least favorite sister-in-law, alien parasites be damned."

"Definitely don't say the 'p' word around here," Jessica warned.

"I'm working on it," Maria muttered.

She turned to the woman when they were inside the larger room and the kids were distracted by the pictures. "He didn't tell you about us when you married him?"

Maria frowned. "I knew 'of' you all, but Matthew was the only one he introduced me to. His mother's trying her best," she added.

"So I've heard."

"He was in the Marines when I married him so our first five years together weren't really 'together', if that makes sense," Maria said. "Two kids was a lot for me to handle on my own and Matthew was a godsend - in all things unrelated to children, that is. He's the only reason we're financially solvent despite Frank's _colorful_ arrest record. Anyway, when Frank came back - he wasn't the man I thought I married. Honesty is a necessity but your family seems to survive off secrets so it's been a _challenge_."

Jessica lowered her voice. "Matt said he went through some stuff and you helped find him."

Maria snorted. "Went through ' _some stuff_ '?  Really?  That's one way to put it.  He put his ass on the line for Hell's Kitchen and almost got killed. Some 'stuff'. Right. He's ridiculous - you're all ridiculous."

Frank turned up with the last dog and several floating bags of takeout signaling Elektra's return. Jessica narrowed a glare in her general direction. "I thought you didn't do grocery shopping."

"Never let her make Matthew's shopping list, she has no idea how coupons work," Maria said.

 

* * *

 

"What do you think about Maria?" Jessica whispered.

Trish considered the question carefully. "It doesn't matter what I think. Frank loves her and she's doing her damnedest to love him back. She wants him to tell her everything, but - well, you know how that goes with us."

"Do I? Because nobody has been telling me anything," Jessica said.

"Fuck you," Trish replied. "Be glad you missed it."

"I'm not. I feel like shit," Jess muttered. "Why didn't you call me when all the shit went down with Matt?"

"Because you were still with that asshole," Trish replied honestly. "I wasn't going to be the one to give him Matty's name to hold over you - I know he's the reason you were such a bitch to me."

Jessica put an arm around her and kissed her cheek. "Thank you for saying that, even if it's a lie."

"Whatever," she rolled her eyes. "I'm so glad you're home."

"I still have a lot of questions."

Trish glanced across the room where Maria and Frank were discussing school options with her very disinterested daughter. "Of course you do, you've always wanted the chance to be a big damn hero for Matt and you think you missed your chance - but you totally didn't. If you stick around long enough, he'll get into trouble again. Never thought he'd go the masked vigilante route like Wade."

Jessica frowned. "That's not why. He said Ellie couldn't find him. That he was missing and nobody - "

She squeezed Jessica's hand tightly. "Forget it. We have to move on."

"The fuck?" Jess hissed at her.

"His request. You think the rest of us don't feel like shit about it? He calls us - you know this - once a week if he doesn't hear from us first. He's been doing it for fucking years - even when we're not speaking, he still makes the damn call. So what, he misses a week, then two – fuck, I was the last one to catch on - as usual - and Wade's his point person for the recovery."

"I repeat, the fuck?"

Trish sighed. "They see the same shrink so he's the only person other than the nun or the sister-in-law over there that's allowed to talk about it. Matt doesn’t want his whole breakdown to change the way we treat him."

Jess stared at her and she raised her middle finger. "You let him get away with that?"

"Yeah, because I _fucking_ get it. If he tries to off himself again and it doesn't take then we get to go all-in on the hovering but we've been warned," Trish said. "We almost lost him, Jess, and we're not losing anyone else. We're all just doing our best, okay?"

"Not okay, but fine, whatever."

"Good because I need your full attention focused on my drama right now," she said, bumping shoulders with her. "I'll help you brainstorm about keeping your spot in Matt's bed after I figure out what we're going to do about my not-dead kid."

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyric tag belongs to Missy Higgins.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay, this chapter drops some bombs I've been building up to and it took me longer than I thought to get it 'right'. I hope I got it right.

_But the home I think_  
_Is a product of the puppet strings_  
  
_And they find it amusing_  
_That a pawn believes he's choosing_  
_That a pawn believes in free will_  
_Like he chose the shoes his feet fill_

 

 

 

"We'll meet next week to go over the final paperwork, okay?" Matt accepted his client and then the extended family's handshakes and hugs before gathering his things and swinging his bag over his shoulder.

"Can I walk you to the door, Counselor?" Foggy Fucking Nelson asked, three steps too close to him in the emptying courtroom.

"No thank you," he replied, shaking out his stick.

"Matt."

"Make an appointment, I have a website," he said.

Foggy sighed but they had burned all the bridges so there was no chance of leaving water under any of them. "Marci met with a possible client today - ever hear of Dorothy Walker?"

 _Goddamn it_.

"Here's the thing, I still don't believe half the bullshit you told me about your past but that woman scared my wife."

"Fuck you," Matt said, wishing his ex-friend's flinch didn't give him a rush of validation but  _fuck him_.  "Call me a liar and ask me to tell you something in the same breath - _nice_."

"Matt - Marci thinks this woman's after a kid, can we just - "

"If she's a client of your firm, you can see me in court," Matt replied. He filed all his paperwork and the emergency custody and protection orders would be signed before noon no matter who Dorothy found to represent her. Plus, she'd be _lucky_ to make it out of the city alive if Wade or Frank spotted her first.

"I knew this was a bad idea - "

"Then why did you approach me?" he asked, wishing like fuck he didn't care.

Foggy's knuckles cracked as he clenched his fists and took an angry breath. "Karen said you haven't visited in a while."

He laughed and knew he'd be spending at least an hour at his priest's today and maybe another hour on the phone to his shrink. "Really? How'd she notice?"

"What?"

"I went every Wednesday for eight months and she never agreed to see me. Never took me off the visitor's list, but denied my visit every time."

"So you just give up while she rots - "

"She gave up on me a long time before she went to jail, so did you," Matt replied, whacking his stick pointedly at the exit door and making Foggy jump in surprise. "Excuse me, Mr. Nelson."

" _Fuck_ ," Foggy whispered when he was several steps away. God, he needed Wade to be on time today - he needed to remove himself from this situation. "Matt, please."

He didn't stumble, he didn't hesitate but it was enough of a reaction for Foggy to catch up. Marci's perfume was like a brick wall blocking his exit to the bus stop - he was trapped.

"Did you tell him, Foggy? _Matt_ \- some lady is coming after your sister - " Marci said in a rush.

He huffed out a snort, **Sister** , right. She believed him _now_? A whistle caught his attention and Eddie approached in unhurried but determined steps. "Wade's busy, I'm your ride. These assholes bothering you?"

"No, thanks for being on time," Matt replied and maybe held onto Eddie's arm a second too long.

"No problem," Eddie said easily but Matt could feel the cold glares he sent toward his ex-partner and wife. "You ready?"

"He's not listening," Marci said behind him. "Eddie, right? Will you listen?"

He scented the gunpowder an instant before the sound pinged and he turned instinctively to shove Foggy and Marci aside an instant before the bullets ricocheted off the sidewalk. _Ow_.

Venom's roar shook through his moment of panic and he pushed himself up quickly. Damage control so _hard_ \- "Wait, Vee - don't lose your cool - " Matt said with a calm that he didn't feel.  Venom spun to face him considering Marci's whimper of fear and Foggy's shudder. "Five count, that's all I ask."

" _You_ \- " Venom snarled but the pop-pop-pop-pop signaled Wade's arrival, he hoped, and the resulting screams as the snipers fell from up high caught everyone's attention.

"Dorothy's in town," Matt said and he could tell Eddie was back in front when he immediately took his wrist to steady him.

"Means they can serve her the papers faster, right?" Eddie muttered, reaching for the shard of pain in his other arm and covering the bullet graze. "Where do you go for this?"

"Church, I've got a change of clothes," he answered.

Venom growls suddenly. " _You touch him and all bargains are null and voice,_ _Franklin_."

"We have to go, Vee, drop it," Matt said. "Please."

"Come on, before the cops show up," Eddie replied softly, leading him away from the stunned couple that used to be his friends. "Fuck those guys."

 

* * *

 

Jessica accepted that she'd missed a lot while she was 'radio-silent' but when Frank got a text from Eddie, everyone went into a practiced protocol that she didn't understand. Trish took the kids to a panic room, Maria and Frank gave each other loaded glares and she was dispatched to Matt's apartment to 'lock it down'.

She didn't know exactly what that meant, but she assumed it was 'turn off the lights and find a weapon' but since it was daytime and her weapons were her fists so there wasn't a lot for her to do. She's a little miffed that she didn't get a text.

If something was serious enough to warrant a trip to a panic room, well, it should be a group text.

The rapid-fire knock on the door wasn't familiar and was probably a danger sign but, well,  they should have given her better instructions. She recognized the blond couple after a moment, _right_ , Matt had friends in college.

She opened the door and tried to pull up their names in her head. "Not a good time, what do you want?"

"Jessica? _Shit_ \- look, I don't know if you remember me but I'm Foggy and this is Marci - "

It took the names for her memory to catch up - shit - ' _lost his law partner and best friend'_ \- Foggy Fucking Nelson -

She didn't get time to fix her mistake because the dogs flooded the room, a trio of barking terror and Elektra's wind flung open the windows.

" **Shit** , if the alien's real we should have figured the ghost would be too - " Marci shrieks, clinging to her husband when Elektra started pulling at his suit jacket with forceful intent.

"Ellie, think about this - is Matt going to be mad if - " Jessica started but froze when she saw the splatter of brown revealed under the jacket. "Is that blood?"

"Someone took shots at the courthouse and Matt pushed us out of the way. We came to see if he's okay," Foggy said.

"And to find out if that crazy bitch that tried to hire us has anything to do with the whole ambush," Marci picked up. "Dorothy Walker, do you - "

Jessica turned to the general area where she thought Elektra would be. "Stay with Amy, you, not just the dogs. Fuck whatever Matty told you, if she comes - " A brush of cold air through her hair let her know she's been heard and she refocused on the pair of lawyers that were once Matt's best friends. One of the dogs stayed at her side and it was oddly comforting.

"Jessica, is he here?" Foggy asked. "The - fuck - one of his 'brothers' picked him up."

"You should probably leave," Jessica said. "I don't know what went down with you guys, but -

"This is a family matter and you're not family," Maria finished her sentence, stepping into the room. She held a Kevlar vest out for Jessica. "Take this, dear, it should fit well enough for now."

"Come _on_ , Fog, we'll come back," Marci urged.

"Please respect the office hours, who knows what could happen if you get caught trespassing," Maria said and the sound of cocking guns drifted from the back on cue.

But nothing else was on 'cue' because Matt stepped into the apartment with his phone to his ear. "Let the cops take her in, Wade, this isn't our call. Goddamnit, what are you doing here?" Matt flinched and lowered the phone when he tracked Foggy and Marci in the space.

"They're leaving," Jessica said, going to his side - he was wearing a different suit this morning - but he only got more tense when she touched him. "What happened?"

"I will walk them out, they're not welcome here," Sister Maggie announced from the door. It seemed to take the nun's declaration to get an actual reaction out of the two lawyers. "Matthew."

Matt turned and lowered his head so she could whisper something in his ear and squeeze his arm. " _You're doing fine_. Call me soon."

"Thank you," Matt replied, raising the phone back to his ear as the nun snatched Foggy and Marci by the arms, clucked her tongue to call the remaining dog to her side and escorted them out like a bouncer.

Frank stepped out and put an arm around Maria, kissing her cheek before giving Matt an evaluating look. "You all right, Matty?"

Matt spoke into the phone instead of answering. "Everyone's at mine, kids included. Who do you recognize from SWAT? Come here, you can have twenty." Matt tossed the phone and Jessica caught his arm and tugged him to attention. "Sorry."

"Answer him, Matt," she ordered.

"Wade's on the way, Dorothy's under arrest and physically intact and Trish and Amy are not cleared for crisis babysitting because Lisa and Frankie are about to start crying," Matt said in a flat voice she didn't like. She took a chance and pulled him into a hug and he leaned his head on her shoulder and took a forced breath. "They're not welcome in my house."

"Understood," Jessica promised. "Are you hurt?"

"Maggie fixed me up." He pulled away and took his glasses off for a quick swipe at his face before replacing them and squaring his shoulders in an imitation of Frank's 'full attention'. "Sorry, today's been a little bumpy. Let's get the kids out of the panic room so we can regroup. Did you open the armory?"

Frank shifted uncomfortably. "Maybe."

"I told him to," Maria admitted. "We'll lock everything back up."

"Just the armory. Since I opened the dining room - I may as well show you the rest," Matt said. "Through the back, Frank knows the way."

"I do?" Frank replied.

"Go toward Ellie's room," Matt shrugged. "She had the rest of our bedrooms turned into apartments, thought renting them out might bring in some extra cash."

"Why is Elektra worried about money?" Maria asked, hanging the bullet proof vests neatly on the rack outside of the 'armory'.

"She takes online classes, got a couple of degrees by now. She doesn't like to ask me for things and her accounting and computer science degrees have been a lifesaver. She made bank during tax season last year, she has a website," he added absently.

"All clear, guys!" Frank called out and part of the wall slid open to reveal a set of stairs. "Huh."

Jessica followed them up but she knew she had to talk to Matt sooner rather than later. She needed to be in the loop.

"Is everyone going to be able to handle a group meeting this soon after the last one? Not that Frank told me about any problems at the last one - " Maria backtracked.

"Venom will be on his best behavior, he hasn't eaten a dog in months," Matt said.

 

* * *

 

She pulled Matt into his apartment when the rest of the family - all of them - were bickering over the last carton of churros Wade supplied from somewhere no one wanted to ask about.

"You went to your mom today," Jessica said when she had him alone. "Instead of coming straight home, you went to her - "

"She's my medic. And she knows entirely too much about my fallout with Foggy and Karen."

Jessica put her hand on his neck and he relaxed slightly. "Tell me." She vaguely remembered the name from Elektra's emails when she would rant about her incessantly but it had been years since her family knew her email address.  She wasn't allowed private communication when she was with - no.  Karen was the secretary, she knew that.

He sighed and covered his face for a moment before words spilled out in a rush. "She didn't trust me. She trusted _Foggy_ who thinks I'm lying about _everything_. I told her to wait, told her to let me handle things and she didn't listen - she killed three men and let Foggy argue self-defense when they had all kinds of shit proving premeditation. She's doing 10-15 on manslaughter because Foggy's a great lawyer, but she could be free if she'd just waited - "

"Maria said you saved Hell's Kitchen," Jessica interrupted, not capable of processing what that level of guilt would do to Matt.  That couldn't be the whole story.

"She's obsessed with _Daredevil_ , Matt Murdock didn't do shit but burn down his life," he snapped.

"Ouch," she whispered.

"I had it under - I _thought_ I had it under control - but when Karen went after those people on her own - all my plans went to shit. Even _after_ I got enough dirt to put the head honcho away - it meant _nothing_ compared to losing my friends," Matt sighed.

Jessica shivered. God, she'd missed so much and now - now. God.  She should have been here - she should have - Shit.  "His name was Kilgrave."

Matt went completely still and she knew she had his full attention. She took another deep breath.

"He knew everyone's name," Jessica confessed. "All my brothers and sisters, he used to run through the names and erase any hint of a memory he could track, anything I'd told him or he could find online - he erased or twisted everything in my head." She took his hand. "But your name wasn't on any of the records he had - our out of state family lawyer wasn't a person he'd consider a threat. He took - everything - I was just a puppet on his strings."

Matt kissed her knuckles one at a time but didn't interrupt.

"I didn't tell him your name, Trish didn't tell him - and Wade, the weird guy I was seeing around corners, he didn't say it - that asshole wanted me to be a blank slate, Matty and it was almost like we all knew not to give you up."

"What happened?" he whispered.

"They were showing some old show of Trish's and he - he liked watching it to see how much I wouldn't react - but he was being - particularly crude and it was like - something snapped. I thought - out of the blue - ' _Matt would never let anyone talk about Trish like that_.' And I remembered the first guy that called Trish a junkie whore in front of you - "

Matt flinched, grinding his jaw.

"You punched the bastard in the throat, sent him to the ER. So I punched _this_ bastard in the throat and - knocked his head clean off," she huffed, only slightly hysterical with the memory. "And here's this guy, bleeding like a goddamn fountain from his neck-hole and I'm sobbing my guts out because I remembered *everything* once his head hit the floor - "

She didn't want a hug but Matt wrapped his arms around her. "I'm so sorry - "

"Wade gave me a B-minus for style," she said. "He just popped up like he'd always been around - he never admitted outright that he was watching me - did you send him to watch me?"

"No, I didn't know you needed 'watching'," he said softly. "He didn't tell me - "

"Maria says our family runs on secrets, I asked him to keep it quiet until - until I was ready to come home. So much therapy, Matt, so _much_. I wanted to be able to sleep three nights in a row without waking up screaming and it - it took longer than I expected."

"You're here now."

"And you have friends now," Jessica said, reining in her nerves. "We're both fuck-ups, without question, but - we're better than we were last year, or two years ago - we're still standing and breathing - "

A chorus of barking interrupts from outside the door and Matt leaned his head heavily against her shoulder. "I'm so sorry."

"What?" Jessica barked back.

" _Some kid's out here asking for Matt and Frank's trying to talk to me about school again!_ " Amy called.

"I can _not_ handle any more kids today, remind me to put up a sign," Matt groaned, tilting his head to 'listen'. "Shit, it's Peter."

"Who's Peter?" Jessica asked, swinging open the door.

Amy at least looked apologetic but the wiry kid at her side gave zero fucks and slipped past her to get at Matt. "You're a hot mess, D, per usual but I need to talk to you, Eddie and Elektra right just now - " Peter said, swiping at Matt's face like he was the family in the room.

"Elektra - not Wade?" Matt hesitated before swatting at the strange kid's hands.

"Nope, he is _not_ to know - for pranking reasons, chop chop - I have to be at work in a couple of hours but I need to get this done before you start a family war over my imaginary honor," Peter said.

"Pranking sounds fun, can I sit in?" Amy asked.

"No," Matt said.  "Go talk about school so I don't have to deal with it."  Jessica didn't bother asking permission, she just took his hand and didn't let go. Fuck these kids for interrupting her moment.

 

* * *

 

"It says something about you, _Matt_ , that you automatically assumed that Wade and Vee were hanging out with me for flirty reasons - " Peter launches when they're back in Elektra's 'suite'. "Because - _dude_ , they're both so old and I spend my nights beating up people for breaking laws like that; I should be totally insulted but then I remember that it's *you* and *you* have hella issues."

Jessica wondered who this skinny kid could beat up and Matt slowly raised his hand. The kid ignored him.

"And then Wade tells me that you're his _secret weapon_ brother so that means you're Vee and Elektra's brother, _too_ and I realized that I was probably going to get yelled at for knowing secrets you haven't told me out loud - "

Eddie raised his hand to match Matt's but Peter continued unfazed. "But it's just _coincidence_ that I know them and they didn't know that you've been helping me. Not everything is about sex, not even what I'm about to show you."

"I have questions," Matt said.

Peter waved him off. "Save them 'til the end, let me talk to Venom - he made me a promise."

Venom shifted into his man-size and turned to face Matt. Jessica kept her eyes on Peter as he fumbled with his backpack and pulled out a set of jewelry boxes.

"I'm sorry," Venom said in his silky growl. "Spider-Man has been helping me with a - project. I thought you were aware of our friendship and were making him stop the project."

"What _kind_ of project?" Matt asked, visibly surprised, and not for the same reason Jessica was. "I could have - "

"You're not an expert at _everything_ , Matt - and I have experience with stuff like what Vee asked for," Peter said. "Elektra?"

Matt returned his attention to Peter. "She's here, what - "

Peter held out the boxes and two gold bracelets and necklace floated into place on Elektra's shape. "Okay, tap the wrists together twice and then tap the necklace," he instructed.

The bracelets made contact - click click - click - and a ripple of energy revealed Elektra Natchios in her funeral dress and flowing dark hair in perfect place. She gasped and grabbed Matt's arm incidentally just - because - " **Ellie**?"

"I'm real," Elektra blinked, stretching her fingers slowly. "I'm - "

"Wow, you're really pretty," Peter whispered with wide eyes.

"You were always real," Matt frowned, finally catching on that they could see what he could probably always 'see' and poking Elektra's shoulder. "I don't like it."

"Hey, you can't even see it, how can you not like it?" Peter protested.

Venom leaned in, extending his tongue but not quite _licking_ , but tasting the air around her. "It doesn't smell human. It is not a body-suit like I wear," he growled at Peter accusingly. "You said - "

"Vee, it doesn't work like that - she could already possess people, I was never going to give her a 'body' to wear as a 'suit'," Peter replied without cowering from the alien. Jessica was totally impressed.

"I didn't know you wanted - " Matt started but Elektra cut him off with a glare.

Eddie fritzed back into place with a huff of surprise. Peter gave a little wave and motioned to Ellie. " _Ta_ - _da_."

"Elektra. You're - wow, you're real again," Eddie said, reaching out and taking both her hands and pressing them to his cheek. "You're warm. You're *you*. Say something, I want to hear your voice."

"God, you're so stupid," Jessica laughed when she saw Matt's shock.

"Matthew could always hear me, but Vee, well, he ate a skinhead I was possessing at the time and after that - we could hear each other," Elektra said softly, sinking into Eddie's arms when he embraced her.

"How are you here?" Eddie asked, running his hands over her back and neck in disbelief as she laughed into his chest. He cut his eyes to Peter.

Peter shrugged. "I wanted to see if it would work when you told me about your sister. Vee and Elektra both gave me their word that they would never - **ever** \- try to take over my body," Peter added, bumping shoulders with Matt and finally shaking him out of his trance. "And I gave them my word that I'd look out for the Devil in return. You're stuck with me, Old Man."

"I need a drink, I didn't sign up to deal with this many juveniles," Matt said, standing up. "Don't forget that you can't call her 'sister' in public if you're sleeping with her, people will get the wrong idea."

"Fuck off, Matthew," Elektra said with a lilting laugh that Jessica couldn't ignore.

"Hey. Let me get a hug while it's still new and nobody's here to see it," she said, yanking her - _huh_ \- completely real sister into a hug.

"It's not a permanent thing, like, maybe don't push it over six hours or so at a time? I'll download the data and tweak it as we go, and definitely don't let anyone steal it - " Peter said in a rush.

" _Thank you for coming home,_ " Elektra whispered in her ear with a firm - solid - squeeze.

Eddie had both hands on Peter's shoulders when she turned back. "Are you sure?"

"Dude, if Tony Stark can make a body-suit for his computer program then there's no reason your sister can't have one, too. As long as you never ever talk about it or where you got it from," he added.

Matt threw his arm around Peter and pulled him close. "I'll give you the _'don't tell anyone my brother's sort-of an alien'_ paperwork and write up an NDA for you."

Eddie nodded. "Yeah, do that - I mean - "

Elektra rolled her eyes and Matt flinched. She frowned. "What?"

"I heard you roll your eyes, just like before. Don't do that," Matt said.

She rolled her eyes again.

"Come on, Asshole, you can't have a drink if you're doing lawyer stuff for kids all night," Jessica laughed, linking arms with him and steering them to the door.

"Wait, aren't _you_ Matt's sister?" Peter asked.

"Foster sister, there's a distinction," Matt sniffed.

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes you have to suck it up and change that chapter count. _(Some stuff happens offscreen that I need to tweak into shape, I mean, what's up with all these parental figures? What's their deal?)_
> 
>  
> 
> Lyric tag belongs to Kai Straw.


End file.
